Wednesday, February 21, 2007

Gurubhai

I have been wanting to watch this movie for a while and finally got the chance yesterday. It was good to see a movie that was based on a person in modern India. Mani Ratnam lived upto the expectation of quality cinema as did the actors, primarily Mithun Chakraborty and Abhishek Bachchan. Madhavan's role, however, was left wanting for more footage (read charaterization).

The only part that I thought was a far cry was the comparison with Mahatma Gandhi. It is true that Gandhiji did not agree with the 'law' during his time, but he did not resort to cheating, bribing and corruption to work towards his goals of national integration against the british rule.

The general opinion about the business of Gurubhai (you know whom I am actually referring to) is very divided. He provided employment to a large number of people and contributed to the country's economy, which matters a lot in today's global structure. His wrongdoings were exaggerated because the traditionally rich families of the country could not control their jealousy.

I feel that one of the most important things is to analyze how he would have fared with today's liberalized policies? Today's businesses, for example the cellphone providers, get liberal policies, governmental support and greater transparency than 30-40 years ago. If Gurubhai were to start his business today, his zeal and dedication would have reaped greater benefits with less wrongdoings.

1 Comments:

Blogger MG said...

Monopolies are never a good idea for any economy - be it a capitalist, socialist or a communist setup. Society bears the cost of having a monopoly around in the form of loss in bargaining power with the Monopolist because rational prices are no longer possible.

Now my problem with the Reliance folks isnt very different. I dont think these guys are worth singing the peans that media/masses do because each side has only side of the story to look at. Media gets its moolah in the form of contracts and advertising money from Reliance which keeps them happy. Masses get their hero who is providing them a service worth '4 paise' per minute. What they overlook is the hefty price they pay on other services because Reliance choked off the competition long time ago.

The question that nobody is asking is ---

In the time where we are talking about more and more competition (because it gets results), why are we worshiping a monopolist on-screen...


Take for example the Telecom sector. While the world is moving to GSM, Reliance wants us to leave away GSM and usurp their outdate system (whose name i cant even remember!!!). I am very sure that this organization (if it is one??) is grappling with internal Corporate Strategy decision-making troubles while they project a lot of growth on the surface.


Then why a movie????

For the record, I dont like these folks.

6:24 PM EDT  

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